Updated: Ekejiuba’s contract numbers

UPDATE: A league source checked in with details of Isaiah Ekejiuba’s deal, which was first reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.

It’s for three years, $5.4 million. He got $1.25 million to sign. Cleveland the New York Jets were both in pursuit.

It’s believed to be the richest contract for a core special teams player. Ekejiuba played fewer than 10 snaps on defense all season.

Watched an entire hour devoted to the opening of free agency on the NFL Network and the only time I heard the Raiders mentioned was in reference Gibril Wilson, DeAngelo Hall and their double-dip free agency bonanzas.

Fifty-plus deals, hundreds of millions of dollars, not a Raider in sight . . .

With everything fairly quiet on the Raiders front, some speculation and opinion to keep the wheel turning:
— I sat in a Napa Marriott Hotel room one day with Jon Gruden, listening to him derisively refer to a Mo Collins-Darrell Russell practice matchup as a “brother-in-law block.” Translation _ they were giving each other a break.

It was the first thing I thought of when the Kansas City Chiefs got Matt Cassel for Mike Vrabel and the No. 34 pick in the draft. Bill Belichick was executing a brother-in-law block with ex-colleague Scott Pioli.

Detroit needs a quarterback and is at No. 33. Hard to believe they couldn’t have done better, shipping a younger player the Patriots’ way.

I happen to agree with the the assessment that with 10 wins under his belt (Tom Brady started the other) for a playoff-caliber team, Cassel has proven much more than Georgia quarterback Matt Stafford.

Vrabel, 34, is a throw-in with no more than a year or two left. He fit in with an established New England defense but not a terrible one in Kansas City. The trade was all about the quarterback, and Belichick gift-wrapped this one to the Chiefs.

— Dallas got backup quarterback Jon Kitna for Anthony Henry, a starting cornerback. Wonder if the Raiders had struck earlier if they could have gotten it done for Stanford Routt?

Kitna is extremely competitive, highly professional and always pushes the starter, but also knows his role. Would have been a perfect backup for Russell.

— If you’re a Raiders fan, you’ve got to love the whole Jay Cutler saga regardless of how it turns out.

Very soon, Broncos coach Josh McDaniels and Cutler will greet the media and invoke some or all of the Holy Trinity of athletes and sports journalism (misquoted, blown out of proportion, taken out of context).

But the beauty if the NFL Network is that you see what we see. If you’ve watched the Broncos post-game press conferences, your quickly realize that Cutler is a life-of-the-party quotemeister when he wins and a spoiled brat when he loses.

He gets a whiff of McDaniels’ interest in Cassel, and he responds accordingly.

That bodes well for AFC West opponents for close games in the fourth quarter.

— If the Raiders get serious about tackles Marvel Smith (Pittsburgh) and Khalif Barnes (Jacksonville), it’s reasonable to infer they believe the tackles they like best in the NFL draft will be gone by No. 7.

From a distance, it appears Virginia’s Eugene Monroe is the most athletic, mobile tackle on the board _ and it doesn’t sound as if he’ll be around.

While Barnes played left tackle with the Jaguars, some feel is he is better suited to playing on the right.

– Curious to see what T.J. Houshmanzadeh will “settle” for in the next few days. As reliable as he is, a 10-yard-per-catch wideout on a team often playing from behind becomes hard to justify when the dollars pile up.

— With Ekejiuba in the fold, the next special teams target could be Justin Miller, who returned a pair of kickoffs for touchdowns.

— It’s been more than two weeks, and the Raiders have still not confirmed the signing of cornerback Chris Johnson.

— I have a lot of respect for the job NFL Network analyst Adam Schefter does tracking down information. He was very good at it before he had the advantage of actually working for the NFL.

Same goes for Mike Lombardi. Even those former Raiders colleagues who aren’t fond of him begrudgingly admit his preparation and ability to have good information on virtually any prospect instantaneously were remarkable.

Yet you watch the NFL Network shows about the signings and every one is solid gold. Hole-in-one, birdie, hole-in-one.

Very little criticism has accompanied the signing of Hall by Washington. The deal the Raiders made to bring him aboard last year had its share of detractors _ including yours truly.

But now that Hall has gone elsewhere, it’s as if he’s become cleansed somehow.

Jerry McDonald - NFL Writer

Post navigation

Jeff George had a career year with Moss. Now that Cassel is on his own too will he be a bust?

MaddenRedneck

Jerry will start believing in the media conspiracy theories like the rest of us by sounds of this blog entry. Hopefully Al had a good visit with Roger and the bad calls will go away this year or we might have Jerry believing in the league wide conspiracy against Davis too.

exlaraiderseasonticketholder

The donkey fans @ denverpost.com are really upset about
the aborted Cutler trade. I just went in there to stir up some sh*t. lol

The donkey’s have just blown their season before it started. What was McDaniel thinking. Not wanting to give your franchise QB the chance to learn the new system. Obviously the Coach does not think Cutler can run it. Square peg in round hole. LOL, LOL.

blackdeath29

i just read the raiders re-signed ekejiuba to 3 years

trojanfan

Let’s win baby! Cut Russell! Write it off on the taxes. He just doesn’t have the right stuff and he definitely is not tough. No one will want him, so let him be the groundskeeper. Sign either Cutler or Warner (or both). These are real QB’s! Don’t blow it twice on Cutler. And for goodness sake, sign Anqon Boldin! He’s better than ten Chad Johnsons, and twice as tough. Let’s at least shoot for a .500 season. Isn’t everyone tired of 5-11, 4-12, etc…, that’s all we will ever get with Russell and the current staff mindset.

exlaraiderseasonticketholder

4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 7:35 am
wheeeee that was fun.I told them how cutler is biggest cry-baby ever,they couldnt even beat the girl-scouts and that they are L-O-S-E-R-S HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAHAHAHAHAH

4eva I didn’t see your post. Did you see mine? What name did you post under?

exlaraiderseasonticketholder Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 7:47 am
4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 7:35 am
wheeeee that was fun.I told them how cutler is biggest cry-baby ever,they couldnt even beat the girl-scouts and that they are L-O-S-E-R-S HAHAHAHAHAHAAAAHAHAHAHAH

4eva I didn’t see your post. Did you see mine? What name did you post under?
————————————————-
Troll alert! Not me.

Spider

Helllllllllo ladiez!!!!! I see you little girlz are still trying to stir up problems in Broncoland!

by exlaraider on 9:48 am, Sun Mar 01

I got a dog named Raider and a tree named Broncos.

Weak very weak. You ladiez need to quit stroking your over stretched clitz.

I got a dog named Raider and a tree named Broncos.
_____________________________________________________

Bwahahhahahahah =) goood response =) LOL

La Milicia Negra

LOL… see what you fools did? you brought in the trash… now clean up =)

Raider O

What is wrong with the fool named KK. He wants to play jay rich at MLB, and TH at SS. What else should we do, play JR as DE since he is 270!!!!!!!! And stop calling people names you idiot. What a moron.

NYMP The Realest

113

Don’t doubt JaMarcus. JRam is the future and the future is NOW! If you don’t think he has what it takes, go watch the 4th quarter of the tampa game when we were down double digits. That was the first of JaMarcus’many 4th quarter comebacks. Actually, he may not have that many because we may always be up going into the 4th! RAIDERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRS!

Spider

La Milicia Negra Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:01 am
LOL… see what you fools did? you brought in the trash… now clean up =)

Helllllllo laaaaaadiez! You fools have done worse than adding to your own trash. You’ve woke up your worse nightmare 👿

Spider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:09 am
La Milicia Negra Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:01 am
LOL… see what you fools did? you brought in the trash… now clean up =)

Helllllllo laaaaaadiez! You fools have done worse than adding to your own trash. You’ve woke up your worse nightmare

My take: I have a tag team partner 😈

True Blue Fader Hater

4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:09 am
EXLA I signed up an all and I still cant post

My take: that’s because most faderz are too stupid to go on other blogs. 😈

exlaraiderseasonticketholder

4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:09 am
EXLA I signed up an all and I still cant post
—————————————–
The Denver Post even emailed me a nice welcome note. LOL

Spider

4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:09 am
EXLA I signed up an all and I still cant post

Hellllllllo! Little fader girl! I see that you are trying to talk to exlax fader. He might know how to log on to the Broco web page but she’z not smart enough to talk you through it 👿

exlaraiderseasonticketholder

They are really starting to squirm in donkeyland! LOL
For example:
Article Discussion: Trade talk worries Cutler
by steven1234 on Today, 11:09 am

Josh McDaniels is turning out to be a complete idiot. This jack*ss signed a long snapper for $1.5 mil that is only famous for making snow angels, while Mike Leach is already on the roster and is still considered one of the better long snappers in the league. He signs 2 career backup RB’s…we have plenty of backup RB’s on the current roster. They screw up one of the contracts with Arrington)……oh and i almost forgot they tried to trade a franchise QB for Matt Cassell???

I have a sneaky suspicion that Shanahan hasn’t been able to wipe the smile off of his face the past 24 hours.
——————————-
Making AD look like a genius.

Josh McDaniels is turning out to be a complete idiot. This jack*ss signed a long snapper for $1.5 mil that is only famous for making snow angels, while Mike Leach is already on the roster and is still considered one of the better long snappers in the league. He signs 2 career backup RB’s…we have plenty of backup RB’s on the current roster. They screw up one of the contracts with Arrington)……oh and i almost forgot they tried to trade a franchise QB for Matt Cassell???

I have a sneaky suspicion that Shanahan hasn’t been able to wipe the smile off of his face the past 24 hours.
——————————-
Making AD look like a genius.

My take: The only thing that would make AD look like a genious would be dying. 😈

Jon

Well just think what C. Johnson is thinking…….D. Hall gets burned all night long by royal and then johnson totally shuts him down and Hall hets this huge azz Contract

Jerry – I’m unfortunately living and have lived in the D.C. area for almost 7 years…they all drink the Redskin’s Kool-aid around here. It was new of the signing but I don’t think folks here are as up on ‘Hall’ as we were with him coming in over the off-season and studying him…Hall came to the Redskins cheap during the season and got good press because he was considered as wise pickup (because he cost virtually nothing in NFL terms for the rest of the season).

exlaraiderseasonticketholder

exlaraiderseasonticketholder Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:30 am
4evaRaider Says:
March 1st, 2009 at 8:26 am
Broncos without Cutler?
by denverpost.com on February 28, 2009

Please keep this e-mail for your records. Your account information is as
follows:

—————————-
Username: 4evaRaider

Spider

Helllllllo! Laaaaaaadiez!!!!! I forgot what I was missing by not posting here for awhile. Nowhere in the world could i watch a faaaader fan who needs to take exlax because greazeball has his kok so far up his arse try to explain to another dimwitt faaaader fan how to post on a Bronco website. PRICELESS!!!! 👿

Njraider3

Ok I thought I was crazy the other day when I suggested the Raiders bring in Kitna to back-up Russell! So thats not going to happen!

RAIDERS RETAIN EKEJIUBA
Posted by Aaron Wilson on March 1, 2009, 10:27 a.m.
The Oakland Raiders have agreed to a three-year deal with special-teams ace Isaiah Ekejiuba that makes him one of the highest-paid special-teams players in the league, according to David White of the San Francisco Chronicle.

The Raiders struck a deal with the Pro Bowl alternate who was getting ready to take a look around the NFL.

Instead, Ekejiuba is staying in Oakland after agreeing to a contract that’s reportedly close to the $1.3 million signing bonus that the Denver Broncos gave to special-teams standout Darrell Reid.